Right, but that still leaves Raak's point unchallenged, doesn't it? There's nothing to suggest that there's a single cause for that particular pattern of brain activity.

Quite right.

For instance, even the mechanisms by which ADD brain patterns arise in the individual are not certain. There is a high correlation between ADD in parents and in their offspring (a figure of 70% is often quoted) which might suggest a genetic link, but it could equally be due to upbringing: the brain is plastic enough that learning will change its structure (no specific references, I'm afraid - I read this recently but can't remember where), and if much of a child's early development is achieved through mimicry then it's quite possible to imagine that parental ADD behaviours might imprint on the child.

It may well be that the role of genetics in mental development is overstated. There is some work (this book, for instance) which puts forward the argument that:

1. there is a common perception that genetic factors are the largest causative agent in mental illness
2. there is almost no evidence of a correlation between mental illness in children and in their parents (the book linked to states that the strongest correlation is in schizophrenia where there is a 50% correlation; nothing about ADD though)
3. if hypothesis (1) is wrong, then it must be environmental
4. the most pervasive environmental influence on children is their parenting
5. therefore the way you are raised is why your head works the way it does.

So, ADD may be at least as much a social phenomenon as a genetic one, although I also think that any learning which has this effect would have been at such a young age that there is no element of choice to it .

I wonder if I could change the subject. Feel free to ignore me. A co-worker is driving me crazy. Her husband hit her and one of the kids and she got a court order that he stay away. Since then, she is trying to find ways to meet him or to justify meeting him. He is possibly suicidal and she thinks this means she should help him. I point out how these suicidal guys sometimes take the family with them (to death), but she still vacillates. She is obsessed and talks about it constantly: outside on breaks, at my workstation, on the phone, in e-mail. She also obsesses about how she wants sex with him and graphically tells me stuff. Oddly, she listens to my advice, which is quite blunt and includes telling her she is not rational now, but I have a law background, not a psychological one. What do I do to get her to get the help she needs? How do I keep her from putting herself in harm's way? How do I (a gazillion other things)?

Personally, apart from - as you mention - trying to convince her to get some professional assistance I'd stay well out, Tina. If she truly is irrational, heaven knows what affect any well meant advice may have on her. If you do attempt to convince her to get some help I think I'd leave the broken relationship out of any coaxing and simply concentrate on the fact that she is under stress at this time ... Then again, I'm no psychologist!

[cross-posted with Duj] How very difficult for you. Are you in the UK? Can you point her towards the Samaritans or even Relate? In my experience [I've been a voluntary counsellor for some years] you are doing the right thing, in that you are listening. If you are happy to be just a sounding-board, for that is all you are, try not be too disappointed if she fails to heed your warnings. By confiding in you, I'm afraid it looks as though she is seeking justification and perhaps your approval for her future actions, ie. she is likely to meet up with him. I would say, your main problem is that her irrationality appears to have transmuted into outrageously selfish and controlling behaviour [towards you] and you have to guage how much more you can cope with. When she's next in 'listening' mode, you might gently point out that you have a life aswell. But unless she admits she needs professional help, there is little you can do, short of frog-marching her into a doctor's surgery. [Blimey! Do I sound like an agony aunt or what?]